Darrell Greer
Northern News Services

Rankin Inlet (Mar 22/00) - London, Ont., will be the next stop for four students who captured top honours at the Kivalliq Regional Science Fair in Rankin Inlet last week.

Baker Lake's Chris Cooper and Rejean LaMarre took first prize with their Polarized Sunglasses project.

Arviat sisters Fiona and Heather Main took runner-up honours with their Diseased Dogs project.

The four will now participate in the National Science Fair in London, in mid-May.

Cooper, a Grade 7 student at Jonah Amitnaaq secondary school, says the idea for Polarized Sunglasses came from a Grade 9 textbook.

"We modified it so it would involve our heritage and that's how we came up with Polarized Sunglasses," says Cooper.

LaMarre is a Grade 9 student. He says polarized lenses are made based somewhat on Inuit snow goggles, but with more slits for light to pass through.

"Our conclusion surprised us because when we started, we thought the polarized sunglasses would block out more light, but the snow goggles actually ended up blocking out more," says LaMarre.

All seven Kivalliq hamlets were represented at the fair, which organizer Barb Legacy says went smoothly.

"The projects were excellent this year. As a whole group, they keep getting better and better every year," says Legacy.

"The students are working really hard at their projects because they know there's some big prizes involved, and they want to work really hard to get the opportunity to meet other kids and get to communities they might not otherwise get to."

Legacy says Kivalliq students are more prepared for the national competition than ever before. She says pictures are always taken at the Canada-wide Science Fair and distributed among Kivalliq schools.

"We're going to be posting these pictures on our new Web site in a couple of weeks and we're going to produce an information booklet in the future so that every year we take it a step further in educating the kids as to what the national fair is all about.

"We really have to thank all our sponsors who do so much for this event, especially Calm Air and the Sakku Investment Corp.

"Their efforts made a lot of things possible this year."